The Multiplicity of the Human Body

The Border between Being and Having

Abstract

Is “my” body really my possession? Unraveling this problem leaves us with two questions: Whose body is it? Is the body a possession? We can rephrase these questions in the words of Gabriel Marcel, author of Being and Having, who asked “Do I have a body? Or am I a body?” These problems in the field of “bio-ethics”, be they at the level of principle or at the level of legal procedure, invariably involve questions of ownership. We must then once again return the facticity of our body to the border between “being” and “having”. At the same time, we must sever the link between the concept of “property”, which has long been viewed as self-evident, and that of “disposability”. The view that one not only owns one's body but, in addition, every last bit of that body is at one's disposal attests to the fact that we have been held captive by the gaze of self-ownership in modern society.